When I Say, “Me, Too”–Day Seventeen #OctPoWriMo October 17, 2017

When I Say, “Me, Too”

When I say, “me, too”don’t mansplain about how some women dressgo into anatomical detail about what shows and doesn’tinsinuate they are asking for it?Do you know what “me, too” means?

No matter where a woman goesShe has todecide when to meet eyes, and when not tofeel guilty if she wants to dress prettymaneuver to keep out of reaching distanceavoid an elevatoran airport shuttlethe parking garagelisten for footsteps behind herDo you?

You have a brain between those earssomeone taught you right from wrongthat brain can overrule hormones, you know

Do you remember Mom saying,“Just because all the lemmings
are jumping over the cliffdoesn’t mean you have to join them”?

You don’t have to participate in lewd talkbody shamingjoke that her clothes are asking for ittouch what she does not want touchedrequire a bribe or payment for that job, that raiseassume her silence is consent

When a woman says, “me, too”she may shake and cryreach into the painshe has tried to buryremember the stranger, the babysitter,the boyfriend, her brother, her uncle,her father

don’t make a jokedon’t make excusesdon’t shift the blame

and if somehow my words cause you toreach inside your dark placesand grasp your own uncomfortable recollectionthen hold that dark memory up to sunexamine its razor edgesIts cancerous warts of excuseplace it on your alteras a sacrifice

When I say, “me, too”will you repudiate the perpetratorstop making excuses?Will there come a day when my daughteror granddaughter won’t have to say,

since i first saw the “me too” posts I have been going back over my life. When? Did I mean that? What does she remember? The woman I stared at in the elevator–please accept my apology. I am sorry I was so uncaring when women/girls faced those situations. The past is gone but I can do better in the future.

Such an AMAZING write up. And that line: And if somehow my words cause you to reach inside your dark places…, is one of the bestttt.I just loved ittt 👌👌.I just loved the way you convey your message by using such precise words.